An ongoing story as of late is the impact of the recent merger of Warner Bros Studios and Discovery. The new CEO, David Zaslav, has already made several controversial decisions that are currently being met with criticism. One big note is the canceling of two features that were near completion. DC’s Batgirl, and the animated film Scoob! Holiday Haunt was shelved with no intention of ever being released so the company could claim them as tax write-offs.
Another big money-saving decision was to pull movies and shows from their streaming platform, HBO Max, that were underperforming so they could save on residuals. The company had already silently pulled a few titles — as recent as the pandemic-shot 2021 film, Locked Down. But they have announced they will be removing around 40 titles as early as this week.
A spokesperson for the company cites the pending merge of the streaming service with Discovery+ as the reasoning for removing the content. Variety reports on a statement made by the HBO Max spokesperson,
As we work toward bringing our content catalogs together under one platform, we will be making changes to the content offering available on both HBO Max and Discovery+. That will include the removal of some content from both platforms.”
The list of the titles pulled from the platform is found below, not including a “select group of Sesame Street specials:
HBO Max Originals
“12 Dates of Christmas”
“About Last Night”
“Aquaman: King of Atlantis”
“Close Enough”
“Ellen’s Next Great Designer”
“Esme & Roy”
“The Fungies!”
“Generation Hustle”
“Generation”
“Infinity Train”
“Little Ellen”
“My Mom, Your Dad”
“Odo”
“Ravi Patel’s Pursuit of Happiness”
“Summer Camp Island”
“The Not-Too-Late Show with Elmo”
“The Runaway Bunny”
“Theodosia”
“Tig n’ Seek”
“Yabba Dabba Dinosaurs”
HBO Originals
“My Dinner with Herve”
“Share”
Cartoon Network
“Dodo”
“Elliott From Earth”
“Mao Mao, Heroes of Pure Heart”
“Mighty Magiswords”
“OK K.O.! – Let’s Be Heroes”
“Uncle Grandpa”
“Victor and Valentino”
Acquired Titles
“Detention Adventure”
“Messy Goes to Okido”
“Mia’s Magic Playground”
“The Ollie & Moon Show”
“Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures”
“Make It Big, Make It Small”
“Squish”